Chapter 461: Signing up for the Tournament

Joshua couldn't help but tap his feet in irritation at how long it was taking for him to be able to get into the battle arena. When he finished looking around the entertainment district he made his way back to the battle arena to get in line to sign up for the tournament, but it hadn't changed from early in the morning. There were still several people waiting outside of the battle arena to get their chance at signing up for the tournament. Joshua wished that he could sign up through the system from anywhere, but that wasn't an update that had happened yet since this was the first tournament and the system was still designing things around how it would work.

That was why Joshua was forced to spend hours waiting in the ridiculously long line. He made sure to hide his identity beforehand since he didn't want to attract too much attention to himself and used the system to listen to the new radio station that had been put up in the entertainment district. It was a shame that he couldn't listen to old songs since none of the technology from the past was brought to the hub city, but there were plenty of musician that had popped up in the last week trying to make a name for themselves over the radio. The unique situation made Joshua think of how even though several things he had to deal with seemed so futuristic some things like entertainment looked like they had fallen back into the early 1900's where radio started taking over media.

Although it was a shame that Joshua couldn't listen to any of the music that he loved to listen to in the past he was enjoying hearing all sorts of new songs and old songs sung in a new way. Hell he was certain a few of the voices were rather familiar from the past, but with all of the elderly getting younger he was sure he'd start hearing a few more older tunes soon enough. While waiting in line and listening to music Joshua started wondering if he should give it a shot. He couldn't hold a single note when it came to singing unless they wanted someone with a deep voice, but he used to play the drums all the time when he was younger.

The fact he was thinking of such things was a sign that he was board out of his mind while waiting in line and that he should have come with a few friends instead of doing it alone. Eventually he did reach the entrance to the battle arena and was let inside to wait at a much shorter line, but still another line. Luckily this time around there was actually something that caught Joshua interest the moment he was let inside the battle arena. There were these weird scanning machines set up around the check in area that people were having to go through once they signed up for the tournament. After they were scanned they were allowed to leave the battle arena.

There was one thing that was interesting about the entire set up. At first Joshua didn't know why people were getting scanned since the first few scans of different people didn't seem to do anything special, but when Joshua saw a man that was rather confident in himself step up to be scanned he could see why so many people were interested in watching different people go through the scanning process. After the man had finished scanning his information was put up for everyone to see. Right away Joshua understood what was going on. Up on the display board behind the scanning machine, the status of the man was shown to everyone. His level was seventy-three which wasn't half bad for an explorer explaining why the man seemed so confident. He also had his job of a knight displayed which was something Joshua wouldn't have known otherwise since the person wasn't wearing any gear. His status however was still hidden which showed the man still had some sense not to show everything that the system had scanned him for.

Above his level Joshua could also see the guild he was a part of and his rank in that guild which was fairly high. After the scanning was complete the man got down with a grin as he confidently walked towards the exit with several people looking at him. With that little display Joshua had a good idea of how things were going to work with this whole tournament registration set up. When you got scanned you would be given the opportunity to display certain parts of your status for everyone to see.

Showing off had both its benefits and its consequences. On one hand it allowed you to show off and gain attention which could lead to you getting invited to a well sought after guild or improve the reputation of the guild that you were already a part of. On the other hand showing off some of your capabilities could allow the people that end up facing you in the tournament to plan ahead. Joshua didn't know if the system itself would keep track of all of the information that was private and public going into the tournament, but it was likely that some group was just hanging around and categorizing everything they could for the news stations. That way they would be able to hype up the upcoming tournament even more.

Displaying your information could go either way, but what held true for anyone that did display their information was that they were all confident in themselves. It didn't take long for Joshua to see what would happen when someone of lower level tried to show off by displaying their status and the way the crowd waiting in line laughed at them it was clear their level fifty-five status and there small guild was not looked on in high regard. The person who did this was rather young and was probably proud of reaching such a level in a shorter amount of time than all of the first wave of explorers had done before him, but that didn't matter here. It didn't matter if you were young and level fifty-five or a long time explorer and level fifty-five. If you were that weak and still planned on trying to show off you would only receive looks of distain and nonstop laughter in return.

It became clear that the people that weren't displaying their status and didn't look like long time explorers were likely those of lower levels. There wasn't really a requirement for entering the tournament outside of either having a level over fifty or having participated in at least some of the battle arena matches. So it was possible for lower level explorers to join, but they weren't going to make it very far with so many top level explorers joining the tournament. In the end they would be little more than cannon fodder for members of the big guilds.

There was another group of people that wouldn't display their information that didn't fit in the same category as the newer explorers that were just joining the tournament for fun. These were the more secretive individuals that were either just taking things to seriously and didn't plan on showing off or were requested not to by their guilds. It was easy for Joshua to tell these people apart from the weaker explorers just by the aura they gave off. They could hide their levels all they wanted, but it wasn't too hard for Joshua to judge how strong someone was just by their aura alone at this point. He had yet to see any of them be at a level that was remotely close to his own, but they were clearly members of some of the bigger guilds trying to quietly get registered and move on.

Lastly there was one other type of group of people that Joshua noticed were registering for the tournament. This group didn't stand out all that much and didn't seem to be hiding their capabilities completely since they would display their status like most others with their levels and guilds displayed, but what was odd about this type was the fact that their jobs were never displayed. At first Joshua wondered why that was the case while he waited in line, but then he figured it out since he fit into this group of people as well.

For most it was pretty obvious what your job was the moment you showed up in full gear, so it was pointless to hide your job since the moment you faced your opponent in a match you'd end up giving away what it was anyways. That was the case for most standard jobs outside of possibly what type of mage you were, but one spell into a fight and that would usually become clear. Instead the only group of people that would truly get anything out of hiding their jobs would be the unique job holders that wanted to keep the trump card of no one knowing exactly what they could do.

Joshua could easily see the benefits to doing this even for himself since most people didn't know his full capabilities. Even when he participated in the battle arena he didn't fight to the point where he showed off everything he could do. He showed off a bit, but he still had several trump cards that he could use and keeping people from figuring out what his job was would be helpful in that regard. Unlike with other jobs if your job was unique enough then people wouldn't be able to figure out its full abilities just from one or two fights. This was going to be a long tournament judging by the amount of people that were signing up for it and keeping people confused on what you could do was a huge benefit in Joshua's mind.

It took a while, but eventually the line got moving again and Joshua was getting closer to the first check point inside of the battle arena. The place seemed to be where you had to sign up and register for the tournament. After that you would have to wait in another line directly after it that lead to the scanning machines. When Joshua got to the registration desk he quickly looked through all the information and guidelines. From what he could tell the first few rounds would be somewhat randomized, but the higher your level was the lower the level your opponent would be in the early rounds.

This set up was obviously designed to clear out all of the lower level people joining the tournament, but it also gave a chance for those people to show off against the higher level individuals that would be in the limelight of the tournament. Outside of that information the guide lines were pretty much the same as the battle arena's regular matches and everyone would have to participate in five matches on the first couple of days to thin out the numbers. After that a bracket would be set up going forward. Joshua just quickly signed up for it while moving on to the next line so he could get it over with.